Dear Readers,

When we launched Waterwheel Review, we were keen to explain why we were so moved and motivated by the image of the waterwheel. Water stands for language, an ever flowing, renewable source; the waterwheel, an engine of labor, circles through, lifting words and then dropping them back into the running stream. Our magazine is a mill, we said, where the waterwheel powers writing and publishing. “We want—and need—to make things.”

For a couple of years, now, we have known that we can’t make enough of our own things while we give so much energy to the work of others. We have had to cut substantially the time and attention devoted to our own writing, and mostly we have been glad to do it, determined to find a way to repay our own work in the end. We never did find that way.

If we could quit our jobs and earn that income publishing this magazine, we would take that deal in an instant. But that’s not the world we live in. For many, many months we have known this, but we couldn’t accept it until now. And thank goodness for that.

Every single issue of this magazine has been a wonder that transported and enchanted us. We can’t say we gloried in every moment. We read or edited or built the site at times while sick, exhausted, grieving—that’s the nature of any publication. But we damn well gloried in every word, every paired image and sound.

Four years and thirty-six issues: What an honor to publish our contributors. What a privilege to offer stunning work to our readers. We must use the word pleasure, too, always rolled out to accompany “honor and privilege,” but pleasure isn’t strong enough, nor is gratitude nor joy nor blessing. For once we find ourselves at a loss for words to express precisely what it has meant to keep this waterwheel turning.

Maybe this will do it: How many times does anyone ever fully achieve the glittering, half-glimpsed vision floating above; that winking, flirting piece of art we ache to manifest? For the three of us, precisely this once.

We will keep making things and so will you. We started this magazine with the image of the waterwheel and a Jean Rhys quote, and we will end in the same way, as we thank you for reading and submitting, and wish you and yours all the very best:

Listen to me. All of writing is a huge lake. There are great rivers that feed the lake, like Tolstoy and Dostoyevsky. And there are mere trickles, like Jean Rhys. All that matters is feeding the lake. I don’t matter. The lake matters. You must keep feeding the lake.

—Claire, Suzanne, Cheryl

September 1, 2024: Waterwheel Review will stay online for the foreseeable future. It remains as it looked for the final June 2024 issue.

Peggy Hammond

It’s Possible My Number Once Belonged to Your Deceased Loved One

by Peggy Hammond

November 2021

When he set the record,
six calls in a day, I blocked him.

I answered once, annoyed
by his unfailing frequency,

snapped my syllables
who are you trying to reach?

brisk, just like my mother
popped bedsheets into shape

on a backyard clothesline.
But he didn’t answer,

defaulted to his question
how’s the weather there?

I don’t know you!
The words jumped from

the tip of my tongue,
fell into the fragile space

between us. And now
I’ve blocked him but I

still peek to see the calls
rack up on my recent list,

wonder and worry he’s alone,
dialing while disconnected

from reality or maybe he’s
too sad, too stricken to admit

his friend or wife, son or daughter
was called to cross Jordan, left him

far behind, dreaming, dialing,
hoping to hear their voice once more.

How’s the weather there? he’d say,
and his beloved would sigh,

contented, and comfort him,
It’s beautiful here.

Peggy Hammond’s recent poems appear or are forthcoming in Pangyrus Literary Magazine, The Comstock Review, Crosswinds Poetry Journal, For Women Who Roar, Fragmented Voices, Scissortail Quarterly, The Sandy River Review, Moonstone Arts Center’s anthology, Protest 2021, and elsewhere. She is a Best of the Net nominee, and her chapbook, The Fifth House Tilts, is due out in the fall of 2022 (Kelsay Books).